Thursday, September 29, 2005

Early readers of this blog will remember Master Gu, Chuan Ze (scroll down a bit). We met again last Sunday, during the 'Taiwan old tea' event. He proudly showed me his latest work: a big cup for oolong tea.

As always with Master Gu, this one is made of a very special mix of clays. These different clays used together provide very artistic patterns on the outside wall.

The inside is even more interesting: on top of the glazing, Master Gu added a mix of powdered, dried tea leaves (after being brewed) and water. He put more of this tea mix on several places on the rim, so that it would flow downwards in the bowl, like a tear, during the firing (at 1230 degrees). Master Gu did several such cups using different teas for the mix (oolong, pu er...) and says that each cup will add a different taste to the tea, depending on the which mix was used. Best is to use the same tea kind as used in the mix on the cup.

I can only confirm his words. This fortunate meeting let me use the bowl I made with his clay and instructions again. I used a heavily roasted oolong I got as a sample long time ago. Heavy roasting often carries some kind of unpleasant charcoal taste. My bowl was able to substantially diminish this bad taste and give it a fresh feeling again. That's why I think that his teaware is a very good choice to drink the often heavily roasted Taiwan old teas.

You'll see mor of Master Gu's works here (in Chinese). I don't see any prices on his website anymore. I just remember that they are quite expensive compared to manufactured ware. No wonder, they are all made by hand, using special clays and proper firing. These are not only beautiful pieces of art, but also tools that improve the taste and flavor of your drinks (not limited to tea!). Looking at it from a contemporary art point of view, I reckon it's very affordable. He will be exhibiting his works in Beijing in the second week of October (a famous place from what I heard, but I didn't catch the exact name).

Tuesday, September 27, 2005

It happened Sunday 25, and I was there! Below this article, I already posted more pictures yesterday. In the meantime, Teaparker has also written an article about this big tea party with over 200 participants in the full red playhouse, in the Simeding district.

The event lasted 2 and a half hours, with many speakers, Teaparker amongst them, to teach and tell us about Taiwan's old teas. Such teas are not very well known among the oolong and pouchong/baozhong drinkers. Tea drinkers usually only associate old tea with Yunnan's puerh. One speaker even talked about this misconception in political terms: "Taiwanese, be proud of your old teas! Don't turn to the Mainland for old puer, but discover the uniqueness of Taiwan's oolong." He seemed to imply that oolong had been invented in Taiwan. Fortunately, I was sitting next to Teaparker and he told our table that this was wrong as oolong originated from China (Fujian, if I remember well) and not in Taiwan. (Nothing political here, just a plain fact.)

The event was quite interactive: each table had a tea set and 3 samples of the old teas presented that day. This allowed everybody to brew and taste these teas while listening to the speakers and a musician.

Teaparker's presentation was one of the most interesting, and the only one to rely on Powerpoint. His subject was more general: what is old tea?

1. Age: A tea starts to be old around 20 years.

2. Storage: To slowly change and improve with time, a tea needs good storage conditions. The humidity level must be kept to a minimum to avoid that the tea turns sour. Tin cans are recommended. Regular roasting is one of the methods employed to freshen up Taiwan's old teas on a regular basis. But such roasting better be light, otherwise the tea may die as it looses all its youth. It's like facial surgery: done lightly and you look younger, but if done aggressively, then you may end up looking uglier than in the first place!

3. Tea quality: Some oolongs are more or less suitable for aging. Jinxuan, a very fragrant tea, is best drunk young and not a good candidate for aging. The best one is hong shui (red water) oolong, because this tea kind is very dry and thus necessitates less roasting. The season is also a factor. Taiwan's dry season is in autumn and so teas harvested during fall will also age better.

How are we then to appretiate old tea?First, let's say how it should not be appretiated: drinking a story. Many sellers will prefer emphasizing by which miracle they got the tea, rather than talking about the drinking experience. So there are many stories of teas forgotten in a trove or buried during the war...

True tea fans will quickly forget such stories and focus on the tea itself. The characterisic of a truly excellent old tea is that it will give you a glimpse of its youth. (I'm still paraphrasing Teaparker). You will not only smell the old, but also see the youth within the tea. Here I'm thinking of my 79 years old grandfather, who only recently stopped writing in the local newspaper. His white hair made him look old already long time ago, but the high spirits he diplays when he talks still let me see his youthful vigor.

This was unfortunately not the case with the teas we drank that day (my private opinion). But it was still a great day and I'll tell you more about my other findings in the coming days.

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

With temperatures ranging from 27 to 35 degrees in Taipei, we still keep the A/C working most of the time. Each year it feels like the long summer in Taiwan never ends. And when it will end, it won't be fall, it will be winter!

In the meantime, I wish I had such a fan (see below). It looks great and the size is big enough to make a good wind. Being able to breath fresh air from open windows does improve the tea experience. The best option being to drink it outdoors.

Thursday, September 15, 2005

Teaparker recently had a tasting of 50 years old tea of its own. You missed it and have not tried my old baozhong either. Not a problem (if you live Taipei)! You'll have another opportunity to get a presentation and tasting (I guess!) of such teas at the red play house, in the youthful Shimending area, on September 25th from 2 to 4 PM.

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Yesterday, I once again tasted my 1985 wild Tuocha. But instead of drinking it on a chair, I decided to get in a more traditional gongfu cha position: on a pillow on the floor and the tea set on a small table in front of me. I know I am still behind with detailed tasting notes on this tea, but I wanted to enjoy it, not study it. I even put some old Chinese music on my stereo. Then I was gone, flying through time and distance, embracing the world from my small apartment. My mind was clear, I could see what matters in my life and felt uplifted.

Yeah, a great moment of tea! The only drawback, and here comes the link to my title, is that this wild pu-er has such a strong qi (chi) that I was sweating like in a sauna! My tee-shirt was completely wet and I had to change it (the shower followed soon!) At 28-30 degrees and high humidity, we are already cooler than at the height of summer. But best will be to wait for another couple of months that the temperature comes down to 20 to enjoy all the characteristics of this very strong pu-er!

Friday, September 09, 2005

The color of the bowl is one of the important criteria. The goal is to find the right color to make the tea 'soup' beautiful.

During the Tang dynasty (618-907), Lu Yu was the first one to study this point. At that time, the tea was cooked and of a transparent green. For Lu Yu, green bowls (see pictures in my article in French and in Teaparker's article) would make the tea look more vivid. This experience can easily be done with white and green tea cups.

During the Song dynasty (960-1279), green powdered tea was more common. It is known as matcha in Japan nowadays. Also green, but hardly transparent, this tea will shine its splendor in a black bowl. Hence, the beautiful Tian Mu bowls crafted in China during that time.

A second criteria is to choose a rather thick and glazed bowl. This will help to keep the temperature high.

A third criteria to succeed brewing tea in a bowl is to choose quality leaves that don't turn bitter too quickly.

The brewing method follows the general principles of gongfu cha:- preheat the bowl (hold it in your hands to feel that the heat is well distributed,- make a first brew with a rather quick, 10 cm over the bowl high. Then turn the water around the bowl and let it hit the edges instead of the tea.- use a chinese soup spoon to take the foam away. Use it also to fill the tea cups and smell the fragrance of the tea.- hold the water closer to the bowl and let it flow slowlier for the following brews.

This 'tea bowl' method can be quite convenient when the guests are more than 4. It will give them a tea show: the sight of the tea leaves slowing unfurling!

c. Chongqing Tuocha, early 90s, Mix(?) - SichuanA. Small, blurred leaves with mold and very dark. Gives a dark brown brew.B. Dry wood becomes wet, mellow wood with smell of underground storage.C. Little sweetness, average persistance, but bitter at the back of the tongue. Unpleasant dryness, but long finish.The smokiness due to fry pan drying has receded, but still not very pleasant. Plus: has a strong cha chi and long finish.

h. Jingmai Region, wild Grown Pu'er, 2003, Uncooked - 6 Famous Tea Mountain Co LtdA. Small buds of light color give a light yellow/orange brewB. A little straw and mellow, light, humid forrest and sweet light smokinessC. A little sweet in the beginning and then again during the finish. A little sour in the back of the mouth and bitter above the tongue. Dry, long and sweet.This is the best pu er of this sampling and by far! And it's a wild grown pu er from a famous mountain. Well, good trees in old producting regions make good teas! The world is sane after all!

Let me again thank this friend in Singapore who made this tasting possible. I am actually glad to have tasted so many bad pu erhs (for free!) Only one out of these eight puer (already selected by a very experienced connaisseur) would have made it to my selection. That says a lot, I think, about the difficulty to find really good pu-erh. And it also shows that age is not a fool proof criteria either! Even 'wild grown' is not a sure thing (see e.). The only thing you can trust are your senses!

Now, I guess some will find that I am too harsh on some of the teas. They may think that I didn't appretiate their character. Maybe. Smokers may find them appealing and give them fancy names like "camel breath"! But my senses tell me it doesn't taste right and I just say so.

Wu Yi Mountain is not only the home to the famous Da Hong Pao, but also to other great teas like the bai ji guan (white chicken). The leaves of the bai ji guan are green/yellow. And the soil of Wu Yi has big rocks from an ancient volcano, which gives the tea its unique character.

Teaparker gave us the opportunity 9 days ago to drink real bai ji guan. I add 'real', because there are so many copies of these legendary teas. Even Teaparker got fooled more than once. 20 years ago, he recalled, he bought what he thought was Bai Ji Guan, but it was just plain Tie Guan Yin. This time, this tea was given to him by the manager of the tea field in the Wu Yi mountain.

We used quite a large amount of leaves and filled the silver teapot about half way. Guess how many tasty, mind blowing, interesting brews we made? 11!

Tasty: not a strong taste at all, but a very delicate after taste and a sense of sweetness, like english toffee.

Mind blowing: each of us had the opportunity to brew the tea. Teaparker proved once again why he is a real tea master: he could decribe the taste of the tea before we drank it, just by watching how we brewed it! He said that one brew would taste kind of watery (unsufficiently concentrated) and with a little astringent feel in the mouth. And that's just how it tasted! The reason was that the student had abruptly cut of the arrival of water in the teapot, and then let the tea flow out too quickly from the pot.

Interesting: we then all practiced the best way to pour the water in and the tea out to get the best result. The flow of water must be steady and even over all the leaves (in circle). And to get a concentrated tea, the tea must be poured out of the teapot as slowly as possible, but always in a steady pace.

Here are the remaining leaves after our 11 brews. They look quite common, but they contain one of the very finest teas of China.

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About Me

My name is Stéphane Erler. I live in Taiwan since 1996 and have been studying tea with Teaparker. He's a worldwide tea expert and author of over 30 tea books. The study of tea isn't just theoretical, but it's also rooted in daily practice. It's a path of continuous improvement. As my brewing technique improves I get access to better teas and better accessories. These things go hand in hand. My blog documents my learning since 2004. And I have set up an online tea boutique with my selection of top quality teas, accessories and tea culture.